


Team equals Family (a.k.a. people Rodney would do anything for.)

by vampiric_mcd



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Team
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-19
Updated: 2010-08-19
Packaged: 2017-10-11 04:01:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/108161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vampiric_mcd/pseuds/vampiric_mcd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>Rodney doesn't know how to do this alone anymore.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Team equals family

  
Fandom: Stargate Atlantis  
Title: Team equals Family (a.k.a. people Rodney would do anything for.)  
Rating: R-ish  
Summary: _Rodney doesn't know how to do this alone anymore._  
Spoilers: not really  
Warnings: implied!torture, implied!rape, coercion, preslash Mcshep  
Characters: Rodney, team!fic  
Disclaimers: I sadly don't own SGA

  


It hurts and Rodney doesn't know how to make it stop.

_John looked sideways at him, quirking a smirk at him. The one that said they were friends and comrades and John *really* liked Rodney, though didn't Rodney know what a pain in the ass he was being._

It's like breathing fire.

_Teyla rested her forehead against Rodney's and he didn't know a more touching display of respect, love and friendship than in that simple but powerful gesture._

It's like drowning.

_Ronon would fight him, beat him down only to quizzically pull him back up. As if he really expected Rodney to be able to do it this time, the next time, sometime. _

He can't do this alone. He knows this to be true. Rodney, for all his whining and bitching, feels at home with his team. They are family. There isn't anything that Rodney wouldn't do to keep them together – to keep them safe – to keep them alive. It surprises him that others see that too.

_Kolya collected Rodney from their cell. Ronon and John were shackled securely to the wall. Teyla had been restrained to the ceiling. Rodney had been lying on the ground with his arms bound behind his back, still dazed from the blows to the head._

Wandering hands and sickly sweet profanity whispered above him and all Rodney can hysterically think of is how this is killing his knees and his back. Kolya cuffs his head, almost gently, as if aware that Rodney isn't focused.

"I will kill them Mckay." Kolya promises so very sincerely, almost eagerly.

Rodney can't do this alone anymore – so he closes his eyes and sucks.

_When Kolya came for him the first night, Ronon fought like an animal trying to get loose. Teyla alternatively tried pleading and reasoning with the Genii commander. John went quiet, his eyes dark and more terrifying than any wraith could ever hope to be. _

Rodney can't do this alone anymore.

_Teyla's hand were shaking when she wiped the traces of semen and blood away. His lip was split and both eyes were probably a nice shade of blue. His body was bruised, his wrists were rubbed raw. He hadn't fought, because he wouldn't endanger his team – but Kolya wanted to make sure his team **knew** and **saw**._

Ronon kept reaching for Rodney, trying to comfort him, only to draw back before making contact. After the sixth time Rodney deliberately slumped sideways against Ronon's body, so the awkwardness was mitigated. He didn't say anything about the tremors that coursed through Ronon's body and Ronon kept holding Rodney close.

John just kept watching Rodney, eyes so very dark.

Rodney screams because he wasn't made for torture – he really wasn't made for enduring pain. He screams even though he knows it's what Kolya wants and therefore is ultimately something to be fought. Knives and sex shouldn't ever be combined in Rodney's opinion, not even when it was rape. He never noticed the camera, which only adds to insult when he wakes up in his cell with his teammates shackled once more and half out of their minds to a continuous loop of his latest rape and torture session.

__

"Just choose one of them McKay, and all of this can be over."

Kolya traced the knife over his throat down to his sternum and back up again. The serrated edge catches on his skin, leaving behind rivulets of blood. It's so very tempting to just lean into it, for it all to be truly over.

"Me, I choose me."

Kolya laughed.

"Are you sure McKay? Because we both know how much I love to hurt you. Wouldn't you like for one of them to take your place? All you have to do is choose one of them."

Sweet, sweet promises. Such beautiful lies they were. But even if they weren't, Rodney wouldn't ever choose.

"Me."

Kolya chuckled.

Kolya must have cut too deep somewhere or thrust too hard. The continuous loop of screaming and blood and torture is only a backdrop to Rodney carefully focussing on trying to breathe. He can't really answer his teammates, who are screaming at him, and Rodney thinks that's just rude because he doesn't deserve that.

When gunfire echoes outside their cell, Rodney knows it's Lorne and the others come to take them home.

It all sort of turns black after that.

  
__

"Move!"

"Losing him."

"Too much damage … treat …. Atlantis…"

" –ney, don't you die on us!"

"John please…"  


  
It hurts when he wakes up. The light burns and it feels like he's drowning. There's a tube down his throat and he can't move his head. A groan escapes him though and three faces move into his line of sight. His team is fine. He tries to smile, which sends him into a coughing fit. Carson moves into his line of sight, removing the tube – letting him breathe. It's like breathing fire, but Rodney doesn't care. Ronon hugs Teyla hard, John's eyes are bright.

Rodney can't do this alone, but he knows that he doesn't have to.

_   
**fic: SGA: Team equals Family (a.k.a. people Rodney would do anything for.)**   
_


	2. Madness is in the eye of the beholder

Fandom: Stargate Atlantis  
Series: Team equals Family (a.k.a. people Rodney would do anything for.)  
Chapter Title: Madness is in the eye of the beholder  
Rating: R-ish  
Characters: John, Rodney, teamfic  
Summary: _Rodney is quiet when he isn’t screaming_  
Disclaimer: I do not own SGA  
Spoilers: none really  
Warnings: implied!torture, implied!rape, dark, coercion, violence, (pre-)Mcshep

  
Rodney is quiet when he isn’t screaming.

  
It’s just plain wrong. There are other things that aren’t right, but John’s lived a life that’s based on don’t ask don’t tell and he’s lived by that so rigorously that he couldn’t bring himself to ask – not even about this. Because really, what do you ask someone who was taken and broken and put together right in on front of you – and now, on a continuous loop.

The worst part of it is the waiting. Waiting for them to come and take Rodney – waiting for them to bring him back. They don’t follow a pattern, except for taking Rodney – only Rodney.

_When the screen first appeared – Rodney had been shackled and on his knees before Kolya – wrong in so many ways. John knew it would be bad – even before the knives made their appearance._

It’s fully possible that John went a little mad when the loop made its third run.

Kolya keeps getting away and John thinks back on when it could all have been decided before things got messed up. John seems to have created a habit that just won’t quit. He’s spread his wings over Pegasus and things haven’t been the same since – he hasn’t been the same since.

Wake up a generation of life-sucking spacevampires – get promoted to military commander – kill a few dozen people left and right – get promoted – gets a nice blue tan – watch his teammate ( family, brother, comrade, friend and more) get *hurt*.

Heightmeier would run screaming from him if he ever told, which he won’t. DADT is a way of life – not just words stringed together with nasty consequences when torn apart. He applies himself very hard to keep them from happening. Only, it keeps getting harder. And maybe it wasn’t all that difficult to apply himself, because he hadn’t found anyone worth the risk. Blue eyes and bitching worse than John would wish on Caldwell, only to be cherished beyond John’s awareness and it all comes down to this.

_Kolya needs to die – painfully._

Ronon agrees. John thinks Teyla might even join in. She’s never been this *emotional* before. The new marine recruits that are training with her all end up in the infirmary – bruised and broken.

Carson doesn’t say anything.

Rodney hasn’t woken up yet.

“Me, I choose me.” Rodney says again and again. John lets himself hate Rodney a little for that, because there isn’t anything that John wouldn’t do to be the one having *things* done to him – if it meant his team was safe.

  
And yeah, apparently Rodney feels the same way.

  
It’s funny how that hurts more than John thought it would. Because only in his fucked up life would someone keeping him and the rest of his team safe equal torture and rape. And Rodney, the most selfish man at times is giving an academy award performance in the leading actor section for self-sacrificing gestures. John would vote for him if it made the fucking loop stop.

  
“Me.”

  
John might never be able to watch television again – or a monologue – or people – or his reflection. He still can’t look away. He owes it to Rodney. Because if Rodney can bear that, then John can bear this – even when he can’t.

And maybe Kolya knows that too.

  
_Rodney isn’t really conscious when they bring him back – drag him back to their cell. There’s too much blood, still too much blood and John doesn’t know he’s screaming for a medic until it echoes in the hallways. Teyla is pleading with Rodney and Ronon is shaking – growling._

  
There’s too much blood.

  
John dislocates a shoulder, but doesn’t care except for the fact that it doesn’t get him any closer.

  
“Me, I choose me.” Echoes through the room, followed by screaming and blood. Again and again.

  
Yeah, John finally gets it now. He chooses Rodney too, but not for this – not to die like this – not to die at all. He chooses Rodney. He’ll be damned if he lets Kolya win the war – even when he’s won the battle.

  
After an eternity, gunfire echoes through the hallways and John screams for the gate-teams advancing on their location. If they don’t keep Rodney alive, John might do something crazy – like kill all of the Genii. He isn’t sure he won’t do that either way.

  
Lorne and the marines see most of the recording, echoing around them as they work to stabilize Rodney and get the rest of the team loose. Most of them turn green, the others look shell-shocked.

John nearly kills the one stupid enough to try and relieve the tension by cracking a joke that isn’t a joke at all. Carson will have a broken jaw to contend with once they get Rodney to Atlantis – **after** he’s treated Rodney – maybe not even for a while then. The Daedalus will have one extra person on board for her next trip from Atlantis to earth. They quickly get the marine out of his line of sight.

  
Lorne gets between him and Rodney, which makes his fists clench at the wrongness of it all. Teyla and Ronon hover behind John, refusing treatment as they watch the field medic’s hands stain a bright red. John wants Carson and it probably shows as they prepare to move Rodney onto a stretcher.

They pass several frightened captive scientists. Lorne tries reasoning with John and it’s all he can do not to start firing on the Genii shackled beside the five marines in the hallway.

  
Kolya is gone.

  
John’s teeth itch madly at the injustice of it all. He tries not to blame Lorne – much. The most important thing is getting Rodney home.

He’ll deal with Kolya eventually.

  



	3. Do unto others as they have done unto you

Fandom: Stargate Atlantis  
Series: Team equals Family (a.k.a. people Rodney would do anything for.)  
Title: Do unto others as they have done unto you  
Rating: PG13  
Summary: Teyla will become Anoï. She will become vengeance.  
Warnings: implied!rape, implied!torture  
Disclaimer: I do not own SGA  
Spoilers: none really

  


She doesn’t know what to do – how to make it better. No words can mend this wrongdoing – no true amends can be made – not even in a shattered bowl. She has known about _defilement_ her entire life, the most shameful of practices to be used in breaking a clan or hierarchy apart. Acastus Kolya has brought *merende* over his and her people – shame over their houses. Still, Teyla will not see this go unpunished. She will become what she never sought to be.

Teyla will become Anoï. She will become vengeance.

  
_She carves it into the wooden bowl herself, as practice demands. A sigil for vengeance, one for evil and one for shame. She nicks her palm and dispassionately watches blood fill the bottom of the bowl. Pressure stops the bleeding and Halling takes over the carved bowl. Teyla watches as the council members repeat her gesture._

They paint the same markings unto her skin once the bowl is filled – again and again.

  
Vengeance – Anoï

Evil – Val

Shame – Merende

  
She kneels as they bring buckets of seawater to her. She stubbornly keeps her eyes open as they pour bucket after bucket over her skin. The cold does not bother her. She craves it. This must be done.

The water tastes like salt and copper, iron and pain.

She bears the sting of her palm – inconsequential. She has seen pain mastered over and over. She can bear a sting so laughable in comparison. She does not let it bother her. All she feels is cold.

The water slowly washes away the sigils painted on her skin, trickling into the sand. She places her hands before her and brings her forehead to the ground. Her fingers are clawed in the wet sand – giving her no grip yet a handful of sludge all the same. She feels it slipping through her fingers, causing her to ball her fists.

“Rise, Teyla of the clan Emmagan, you have washed away merende – the shame of our failure.”

A bucket of ice cold seawater lashes over her skin.

“Rise, you have sworn retribution.”

Another.

“Rise, your clan is cleansed from evil. Val has been conquered.”

Another.

“Rise, you will see us free from this burden.”

Another.

“Rise. You have become Anoï. Vengeance. ”

Another.

She stands slowly and meets her people’s eyes coolly. She has failed Rodney, a member of her chosen clan. Kolya has shamed himself and her. By Athosian law, retribution must be sought. Teyla has never been more eager to comply. Like the seawater, this has left her cold and unrelenting. She will not stop. She will bring back honor to her people and to her chosen clan. She will bring honor if not forgiveness back to herself. She will not rest before she sees Kolya on his knees before her clan, his life’s blood vanishing into the earth like seawater in sand.

She has become * Vengeance* and she bows for no one.

  
Before the people from earth came, Teyla did not use the word ‘alien’ to describe inhabitants from another planet. To her ‘alien’ means being different from the norm. The Lanteans use the word to describe everyone they trade with – everyone and everything they meet. They use the word for her people and others, they use it for more animalistic species.

She has never felt more *alien* than amongst the Lanteans – and sometimes she is tempted to use the word for them. It strikes her as odd how everyone else seem to qualify as aliens to them, but that they do not realize they are just as alien to those they encounter.

In truth, they are the same – and thus deserve to be categorized as just as alien.

Teyla sometimes fears that all of this can only end in misery. They who cannot acknowledge their equals do not inspire equality. She keeps silent – and watches the aliens as they invade the city of the Ancestors. At times, she cannot describe the sense of displacement and wrongfulness.

So, she claims them as her own – claims three as her chosen clan. She mourns Ford when he is lost to them, but welcomes Ronon – who is just as alien to the Lanteans as she is. They are the same. Still, she does not count John and Rodney and several others as different, not anymore. Ronon , John and Rodney are her family now. They are her chosen clan. They are one, even if they do not know that.

She has made them so.

  
_The marines that train with her leave broken and bruised. She does not care – not even when Elizabeth thinks to correct her behavior by merely telling her to do so. They are unworthy._

She has heard some of them in the hallways – laughing and sniggering. She has seen others ignore them doing so. She knows what is being whispered on the air. Even when they merely listen, they incur her wrath.

Rodney has borne her burden and they seek to shame them further.

She sends those unworthy crawling to Carson, who has heard what John has not. Carson understands clan better than most of the Lanteans and Teyla has claimed him as an extended member of hers. Rodney, for all his bluster, sees the doctor as family. Teyla is pleased to see his trust was not misplaced. The marines are silently treated, then sent away.

Rodney has not woken up yet.

Radek Zelenka is another member of her extended family now. Rodney has chosen well. She hears large portions of the Lanteans are without warm showers and heating. Like Anoï, Atlantis can be cold and unforgiving. They will learn, even if Teyla has to shame them all into doing so. She does not understand that not all of them *see* the truth. She does not understand that they would rather shame themselves than seek retribution for the wrongs committed to one of their own. Still, she won’t leave them blind.

Sadly, Elizabeth has become as alien to Teyla as Teyla must seem to her these days.

Teyla has become Vengeance. And she bows to no one.


	4. Unmovable Regard

Fandom: SGA  
Title: Unmovable Regard  
Series:Team Equals Family part 4/4  
Rating: PG-13  
Summary: Ronon was unmovable.  
Warnings: whump!Rodney, h/c, implied!rape, torture, read at your own risk.  
Disclaimer: I don't own SGA  
Spoilers: None I think  
Word count: 1467  
A/N: This fic is finally finished. Ronon's part was half written and then would just not be finished. I'm glad it's done and hope I've done justice to them all.

  


_Ronon was unmovable._

  
He sat beside Mckay’s bedside and did not heed Beckett’s concerns or Weir’s disapproving frowns. He had to stand vigil. He couldn’t leave. It was his duty to keep watch. It was his honor to serve. Mckay deserved all that Ronon could possibly offer him. Ronon knew pain and shame. He had already failed greatly once before. He would not be shamed into failing to offer protection, comfort and respect in this manner as well. And McKay was *his*. And that meant more than Ronon wanted or could explain. Anyone who took offense would just have to swallow their own pride.

  
Ronon was unmovable.

  


Ronon watched how McKay’s chest rose up and down and he listened to the irritating beeping of the heart-monitoring device. The rhythm was soothing in a horrible kind of way. He watched Sheppard staring at McKay in a determined focus that frightened most of the people on the Atlantis mission just a little, even if they didn’t quite like to admit it. Terrans could be quite strange.

  
Ronon got it though – he got them – McKay and Sheppard.

  
It wasn’t that odd because combined with Teyla, they were a team. It was even more than that, they were a family. They stuck together and would go to the end of endurance and even their very life for each other. They would swallow their dignity and beg for each other if not themselves. They would hurt for each other. And Rodney had proven that without trying to.

  
__

  
“You’re very pretty for a Runner.”

  
He was tired and sick and undernourished. He had been running for months now, maybe even a year. Maybe even longer. But he needed to sleep. He needed to rest. He needed to eat. There were some places that catered to the damned – places that the wraith found amusing and never targeted as long as the population of those places didn’t grow too large. Every Satedan knew the addresses by heart – so they never should go there.

  


McKay screamed and pleaded and abased himself but he never asked for them to suffer in his stead. Ronon was sure that it never crossed his mind. That the idea of any of them going through the same thing would torture McKay far worse than what Kolya was putting him through. When Ronon finally had to watch the loop, it didn’t prevent him or Teyla or Sheppard from going a bit mad. Seeing the results on McKay’s body after being tortured couldn’t quite compare to having to watch them be inflicted over and over again. Especially since McKay only endured and suffered to keep them safe from the same harm being bestowed on them. Every hurt was shared.

“Just choose one of them.” Kolya murmured steadily in the background. It repeated over and over again, while Ronon was straining to get to McKay and cradle him in the aftermath of what was being displayed over and over again. McKay’s limp body and uneven rise and fall of his chest made Ronon worry that Kolya had passed the point of no return with Ronon’s family – that he’d pushed Rodney over his physical endurance – that Ronon was going to have to watch another member of his family die while chained to a wall like a dog.

  
“If you choose one of them, all of this will stop.”

  
“No.”

  
“No.”

  
“No.”

__

  
A hand knotted itself in his braids and Ronon tried to clear his head. Everything felt laboured and hard to do. He was running a high fever and he didn’t know where he was. Everything was addled. He still felt it as that same hand moved over his body and Ronon made a sound of protest as he realised he was naked.

“Hush runner.”

  
A weight settled on him and he felt a sharp pinch in his neck when he tried to buck the stranger off.

  
“Shhhh”

  
Within moments Ronon felt even drowsier and couldn’t control any part of his body. He somehow knew that he would be scared and angry if he could just focus for a moment.

  
“So very pretty.”

  
Another voice came out of the dark.

  
“Agon, you know he didn’t dial our gate himself. They just tossed him through. We have no rights to his body.”

  
The weight pressed him down and Ronon could hardly breathe let alone think.

  
“I don’t care.”

  


  
Ronon knew what it was like to be broken – to be shattered down to the deepest sense of self. He knew what it was like to lose all that was left of his tattered pride, stripped down to the bare essentials – raw and jagged – barely hanging unto something resembling survival.

Ronon also knew that words could hurt more than physical wounds. And yet he also knew how very easily pain could cripple a person even when words would not. Ronon acknowledged that the lives of those he loved were worth more than his own – and he knew how it felt to try and protect them at any cost and have it slip from his fingers.

  
So when those blue eyes opened once more, Ronon suppressed the urge to whoop out a victory cry. He would share that victory by performing one of Sateda’s most sacred traditions – one he had proudly and gladly claimed as his world’s birth rights. He purposefully thumbed his new tattoo under his left ear, where it was situated just behind the jaw line.

  
It was a good place for remembrance – eaily visible when displayed yet discrete. The location was one of the factors in ranking a Satedan’s markins. He would have to explain to Mckay how important this was. How unusual it was for any non-Satedan to be marked in their ways. He would do so in time. But first came the remembrance. First came their celebration of their victory – of their survival. That would take enough as it was.

_He brought the ink and the needled pen to Rodney’s bedside. Sheppard was snoring on the spare bed – pushed up close to Rodney’s. Ronon thought that it was probably the only sleep Sheppard got without nightmares – some part of him subconsciously knowing McKay was alive and close by._

  
McKay glared at him as he entered, clearly cautioning him to be silent. Ronon had no intention to wake Sheppard though. This was just between the two of them for the moment. McKay watched him closely, then watched him in interest as Ronon rubbed his own new inked mark.

  
“What does it mean?” Rodney whispered, his voice still hoarse.

  
Family – survival – torture – pain – love.

  
“Everything.” Ronon spoke calmly. Rodney watched him for a moment – watched Ronon’s tattoo again and then deliberately tilted his head. Indelible proof of what happened and what it all meant.

  
Acceptance.

  


  
Ronon knew that most of those that spread whispers and rumors about McKay were either jealous or afraid. Some of them were afraid because if it could happen to Mckay, then it could easily happen to them as well. And several more were jealous because it were to happen to them, they might not have someone who would bare such torture for them in return.

  
Perhaps they were jealous as well as afraid because they feared that they wouldn’t have it in them to sacrifice themselves for anyone else either. It was heartrending to see someone balance the lives of their teammates through every decision made. It was even more gutting to known that one might not return the favour though. After all, not all teams were as closely knit and guarded as theirs. Not all teams or expedition members depended on each other as a family unit. It took a strong person to undergo what McKay suffered. It took an even stronger person to choose it for themselves when they could have just let someone else hurt – even for a little while.

  
Perhaps he should pity those whose relationships weren’t as strong, but he didn’t. While he could understand them to a certain degree, he didn’t forgive them. And thus he didn’t say anything when a wrathful Teyla circled them all like a hungry predator out for blood. He didn’t say anything when Sheppard narrowed his eyes at anyone coming too close to McKay for comfort assessing the threat where there should be none.

  
Ronon just watched and waited. They would overcome whatever was lying in store for them – perhaps in the end even death though never mortality.

  
_Ronon stood guard over his family, watching Sheppard brush his lips over those of a sleeping Mckay. Sheppard’s fingers lingered on McKay’s tattoo, already healed by Ancient technology. The love and hope was present in each gentle stroke. Ronon was sure that everything wouldresolve itself in the end._

  
In the meantime, Ronon would remain unmovable.

  
The End


End file.
